


Clockwork

by sensitivebore



Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Alternate Universe - Steampunk, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-22
Updated: 2013-01-22
Packaged: 2017-11-26 11:41:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/650150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sensitivebore/pseuds/sensitivebore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Carson and Hughes, and the mechanics of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clockwork

She is polishing the banister with a soft cloth, over and over. This is what she does when the others are busy and she has nothing to do, when she's between shifts of maids, when they're all occupied making beds and dusting. Elsie stands here, polishes the already gleaming wood, buffing it over and over. It's what she's programmed to do, really, she doesn't know anything else.

She does, though, maybe.

Carson is turning the bottles of wine in the cellar so all of the labels are perfectly straight, perfectly aligned. It's his keep-busy work when all of the footmen have been dispatched around the house, when it's not time to clean the silver or when he's already laid the afternoon tea tables. He can't do anything else but this, this endless turning of row after row of glass bottles. There's nothing else for him.

There is, though, somewhere.

Something clicks in his mind and he looks up, blinks, realizes it's time for the staff to have their early tea, to eat before they have to start preparing for the formal dinner upstairs. He turns one last bottle, leaves the cellar.

A soft chime sounds in her brain and it's time for tea; she calls the maids away from their assigned bedrooms, directs them to go immediately to the table. Elsie never allows them to miss a meal, understands that they have to eat regularly to work regularly. She slides her hand along the smooth mahogany as she descends the stairs.

He sits at the head of the table, as always, with her at his right hand, and they pass the food, the drink, make acceptable conversation. There are certain topics that are allowed between she and him — the work, what's on at the pictures, upcoming holidays. Other subjects — love, sex, desire, loneliness, feeling — are denied, cut off, inaccessible. They are not built for that.

But there is something. Sometimes.

Elsie and Carson push their food around on their plates, admire the pretty shapes of it, the textures, the smells. They do not eat a single bite. What would be the use? He pours them both a glass of wine and they smile at it glimmers like rubies, in dark red pools against pristine glass. They do not drink it. Why would they?

They give the maids and footmen a half-hour, no more, and then they rise from their chairs simultaneously; the cue for everyone to rise, for everyone to get back to work. There is always much to do and never enough time to do it, so there's to be no dawdling over cups of coffee and cigarettes.

She is fascinated by cigarettes. Fascinated by the red hot fire on the end, by the pale blue smoke that O'Brien inhales and exhales softly in a misty cloud. Elsie had tried it once, alone behind the stables, but was disappointed. She usually is when she tries things like that, because she felt nothing. She never feels anything.

But now and then, perhaps.

They are a unit, she and him, and this unit has worked perfectly and in harmony for over a decade but something is happening, something is changing beneath her pretty plush skin, something is shifting beneath his shining grey eyes. Something, something. The clicks of his mind and the chimes of hers are beginning to speak in some odd new language that neither of them can quite comprehend and they are both aware of it.

For ten years they have quietly and obediently went into their closets at the end of every night without a word of protest, with a smile even, sometimes even with a word of gratitude. Not anymore, now they struggle, they fight, she cries out desperately, wordlessly; he strains against the arms that press him back.

Tonight is no different.

Robert and Cora have come downstairs to thank them for the dinner — oh, lies, horrible lies, they are exchanging premeditated, cunning glances, they think their pretty lies have taken down their guard, but no. Tonight is no different. Her Ladyship takes Elsie and the Lord takes Carson and they scold them, tell them to stop struggling, threaten them with severance if they don't stop this immediately, if they don't obey.

It's useless to fight with them because in the end Cora's fingers are too fast and Robert's too sly and the pretty brass keys that are hidden beneath her hair at the nape of her neck, under the white silk of his tie at the base of his, are pulled and turned and they are winding down quickly, gears are clicking, clicking, cogs are slowing, and Elsie gives a last spirited attempt to throw off the thin arms pushing her into the cabinet, sounds a muffled cry of pain when the gleaming glass door closes. She looks at him, bereft, lost; they look at each other every night after these horrifying, traumatic separations, for aren't they stored in cabinets at opposite ends of the same hall? Don't they stare at each other in frozen need for every endless black hour of the dark?

He raises one hand, presses it to the glass in front of him.

She mirrors his movement.

"What do you think it means?" Robert is looking at them, annoyed, irritated.

Cora shrugs. "I've no idea. Perhaps they're broken; we'll have a builder look them over soon. It's funny, though, isn't it?" She giggles, points. "It's almost like they want to touch one another. Kind of cute, really."

They check the locks on the cases, turn out the lights, go upstairs.

Clockwork ticks down slowly as his other hand touches the glass, as he stands there making that pleading, searching gesture, as he stares at her with a broken longing.

Before she runs down completely for the night — she can feel it, she's frozen in place now, all that's left is the small gears of the fingers, the thumbs — she uses her last tick of energy to mimic him again, to smooth her other palm over cold glass. Elsie tries to smile, tries to comfort him here from twenty feet away, from her locked box.

Carson fights the inertia that is moving all through him now; he refuses to shut down until she has, he refuses to leave her alone in the dark and the cold, slammed into that tight, hard coffin of a cupboard.

Her eyes click shut, the soft sounds of bells announces that she is now without power, that she will not move again until she is wound up, given instruction. He follows her soon after.

The clocks tick, the house settles around them. As always, they stand their dead, silent sentry.

 


End file.
